"Eh? This was a gift sent to you by the WGO. Would it really be okay to give it to us?"
Yuki Yoshino froze for a moment before blurting it out. Everyone else had the same reaction. The ingredients and seasonings here were all ridiculously valuable—and they were a gift meant for Kael. Was it really fine to hand them out like this?
"What's so wrong about it? Since they were given to me, I get to decide what to do with them."
Kael didn't think much of it. It wasn't like they came from someone he had romantic feelings for. It was just something the Nakiri family sent as a gesture of goodwill.
"Kael-kun is right. Since these items were delivered into his hands, they belong to him now. How he uses them is his choice."
Seeing everyone's hesitation, Alice stepped in with a smile.
With the Nakiri heiress herself saying that, the others stopped worrying. If Alice said it wouldn't affect Kael, then it wouldn't.
And since Kael insisted, none of them wanted to be overly dramatic about it. They'd simply remember this favor. If Kael ever needed their help someday, they'd definitely repay it.
Not that they believed Kael would need their help.
His cooking skills and talent were obvious. The residents of the Polar Star Dormitory weren't idiots—they all understood that Kael's future achievements would be far beyond theirs.
At best, they'd maintain a friendly relationship. But Kael? He'd never need anything from them.
Once everyone agreed, Kael struck while the iron was hot, immediately pulling out the ingredients and recording everything with his Divine Senses.
Thanks to the overwhelming sharpness of his abilities, it didn't take long before every ingredient was perfectly stored in his memory.
"What a ridiculous ability. You can memorize an ingredient just by listening to it touch something…"
Divine Hearing was completely different from the God's Tongue. The God's Tongue needed to taste something to record it. But hearing? They couldn't imagine how that worked at all.
But Kael showed them exactly how—just listening to the sound of contact was enough. And it wasn't only his Divine Hearing; the rest of his Four Divine Senses could easily record the ingredients too.
After finishing, Kael kept a few things he was personally interested in and split the rest among everyone.
Some went straight into the Polar Star Dormitory kitchen freezer. Some were saved for tomorrow's meals. But most were packed up to send home.
There were simply too many ingredients. Even if the dorm doubled its population, they still wouldn't finish all of it.
The next morning, Kael arrived at the testing site with Alice Nakiri.
"Are you sure skipping class isn't a problem?"
Kael glanced at her.
"Of course it's fine. I'm much more curious about your Divine Hearing than any lecture."
Alice laughed. For her, class wasn't difficult—she could learn anything on her own.
Inside the test facility, Senzaemon Nakiri, Erina Nakiri, and a team of specialists were already waiting.
Now that Kael had arrived, the tests officially began. All he had to do was listen to the ingredients placed in front of him, memorize them, then continue the tests blindfolded.
Beyond ingredient testing, there were also long-distance tests, noise interference tests, and more. Kael looked over the test sheet and couldn't help admiring the professionalism—this kind of work really needed experts.
After he memorized all the ingredient data, Kael put on a blindfold.
Seeing him like this, Erina suddenly felt a sense of déjà vu.
She had once undergone a similar test. In this world, there were many with abnormal senses. But those whose senses reached the level of a Special Ability… only the God's Tongue qualified.
And whether a sensory enhancement counted as a Special Ability required strict testing. Characters like Yuki Kuramochi with abnormal touch or Hayama with his extraordinary sense of smell didn't come close to true Special Ability territory.
The moment the test began, Kael flawlessly identified each target. He didn't even pause.
Everyone was stunned.
Even when Erina had tested her God's Tongue years ago, she hadn't been this overwhelming. For the more difficult test items, she had needed a moment to think.
Kael, on the other hand, answered like he already knew everything from the start.
By the time the randomized ingredient sequence test finished, his accuracy rate was a perfect one hundred percent—greater than Erina's current level.
After all, the God's Tongue grew slowly. In the beginning, even it made mistakes.
"Ingredient testing is complete. Next, we'll begin the remaining evaluations."
A staff member called out before they shifted to long-distance auditory tests, trying to find the limits of Kael's Divine Hearing.
And the result?
They didn't find the limit at all.
Even after exhausting every test they prepared, none came close to pushing Divine Hearing to its edge.
Next was the interference test. They took a single ingredient and surrounded Kael with massive speakers blasting deafening noise. Even shouting near each other became impossible to hear.
Yet Kael effortlessly detected the faint sound of the ingredient brushing against another object.
He even demonstrated echo-location—using reflected sound to map the terrain and objects ahead.
Everyone was completely floored.
The testing dragged on for several hours. By the end, the entire team was numb with shock.
"This is unbelievable. Your results far surpass even Mana Nakiri's final stable test before her God's Tongue went out of control."
Senzaemon Nakiri stared at the report with visible disbelief. The God's Tongue grew stronger over time, so he had assumed Kael's Divine Hearing would do the same.
He originally planned to compare Kael to Erina's current test values.
But Kael's results completely crushed Erina's.
He had no choice but to compare Kael's data to Mana Nakiri's final recorded peak.
Since the God's Tongue stopped progressing after losing control, that old report still served as its highest reference point.
And Kael had surpassed even that.